The impetus for mankind to create buildings is likely traceable to the original desire for more comfortable domiciles. Throughout millennia and around the world, various peoples have used indigenous materials to create shelters that resist the elements and provide warmth, space, and protection. The variety of materials used for this general purpose range widely, from bamboo poles and palm thatch to stone and adobe brick, animal skins and snow blocks, logs and oakum, lumber, concrete, steel and glass.
Despite the diversity of building material that have been used, the general approach to designing buildings has remained remarkably similar throughout the cultures and peoples of the world. Generally speaking, domiciles and other buildings are constructed of load-bearing walls that support a sheltering roof. If this concept is extended, the floor may be supported by the bearing walls to be spaced above the ground, and more than one floor may be provided in vertically spaced relationship, also supported by the load-bearing walls. Exceptions include the Inuit igloo, built of snow blocks in a dome shape, and the teepee of the plains Indians, but these structures are at or below grade level and cannot be extended upwardly.
The general approach for construction of a home or similar small building has evolved into a standard procedure. First a framework for load-bearing walls is constructed on a suitable foundation, then a framework for the floor(s) is added, as well as a framework for a roof. An exterior surface is added to the walls framework, a roof is added above, insulation is added to the walls, flooring is placed on the interior framework, and interior finish work is applied to create amenities for the interior rooms. That is, first the mechanical structure is created, and then the remaining parts of the building are hung on the structure to form the finished construction.
This approach to building tends to view each building sub-system as a separate entity with a function that is not directly related to the other sub-systems. For example, exterior siding is not considered to be a structural reinforcing element, nor is the insulation utilized in a way that would augment the load-bearing strength of the walls. In this piecemeal approach, the sub-systems are not synergistic. In addition, this standard approach to building construction requires a large amount of skilled labor from several distinct trade groups: carpenters, plasterers and sheetrock workers, and roofers. In general, the amount of skilled labor required, together with the sub-system approach to construction, has resulted in home construction and small building construction in general being expensive. These factors have priced home ownership beyond the reach of too many persons, particularly outside the developed, industrialized countries of the world.
One approach to overcoming these obstacles to inexpensive homes and buildings has been the creation of modular buildings manufactured in mass production and transported to a construction site. Generally speaking, these modular arrangements continue to rely on the traditional approach to construction, including load-bearing walls to support the floor(s) and roof, and each sub-system remains a separate entity in a functional sense. However, each module incorporates portions of each building sub-system, which are joined at the construction site to form a traditional construction. The advantage in cost is due to mass production, not to structural innovation, and there is a penalty to be paid in enforced uniformity in building design.
There have been many modern innovations in structural design and materials, but these innovations have not been widely adopted. The Quonset hut of W.W.II exploited the inherent strength of an arch to form a shelter of relatively thin sheet metal and no other supporting structure, and was cheap, portable, and easy to construct. However, the noisiness of the bare sheet metal and the lack of thermal insulation prevented its widespread use beyond temporary military buildings. Likewise, the development of tensegrity principles by Buckminster Fuller and their application to geodesic domes resulted in a few structures of renown, some military uses (radomes), and virtually no ongoing commercial success. New materials such as structural foamed plastics have been applied most notably as shear connectors in sandwich panels for aircraft wing construction, by Bert Rutan and others, and there is an active and growing interest in applications of structural insulated panels.
There remains in the prior art an unmet need for a inexpensive, practical approach to building a home or small building that is durable, comfortable and easy to construct.